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I’ve talked before about cooking dishes for “in lent” and alternative thickeners but I thought this pie, “A Frydayes Pye” was interesting because it deviates in instruction from what I expect from a herb and apple pie.

I have the recipe for “Tarts of Borrage” on page 229 of my Big Buttes Book, and its different from the recipe below because it wilts, or blanches the herbs, and softens the fruit before they are baked. They are also baked along with egg yolks, which this recipe also doesn’t have.

I’ve combined the ingredients, and I started making this using a closed pie instead of an open tart so the greens wouldn’t dry out, and I felt it was more “coffin” as described in the original.

Well after 45 minutes it was a soggy wet mess. I opened the lids and cooked them uncovered for another 30 minutes to try to salvage them.

The greens did dry out with the open lid but it wasn’t unpleasant. My husband had thirds, so not a complete disaster.

My dog keeps trying to steal it, which is weird. He isn’t a table surfer, but he seems strangely motivated.

I consider the pie a failure, but luckily I have a husband (or a dog) who will hide the evidence. When reading through historic recipes, we don’t have the author’s notes or reasoning behind their decisions. We just have to try it as written and see what happens.

I also think that if I’d cooked them as smaller hand pies and on a higher heat it might not be as soggy. Also blanching the veggies and squeezing out the liquid would go a long way.

A Fridayes Pye, without eyther Flesh or Fish. Wash greene Beetes cleane, picke out the middle string, and chop them small with two or three well relisht ripe Apples. Season it with Pepper, Salt, and Ginger: then take a good handfull of Razins of the Sunne, and put all in a Coffin of fine Paste, with a piece of sweet Butter, and so bake it: but before you serue it in, cut it vp, and wring in the iuyce of an Orenge, and Sugar. John Murrell A NEVV BOOKE of Cookerie (England, 1615)

Sometimes you find two recipes that are fairly similar but with small differences. Like the two recipes that are back to back in A BOOK OF COOKRYE :

To bake small meats.Take Egges and seethe them hard, then take the yolkes out of them and braye them in the morter, and temper them with Creme, and then straine them, and put to them Pepper, Saffron, Cloves, Maced, small raisins, Almonds blanched and small shred and grated bread.
Take Peares also sodden in Ale, and bray and straine them with the same Licour, and put therto Bastard and Honny, and put it into a pan and stir it on the fire til it be wel sodden, then make little coffins and set them in the Oven til they be hard, and then take them out againe, and put the foresaid licour into them and so serve them forth.

To make small bake meats of Sirup and Peares.
Take Peares and seethe them in Ale, then bray them and straine them and put Sanders to them and Ale, with the spices aforesaide, and the Coffins in likewise ordered, and so put in the sirup. A.W. A BOOK OF COOKRYE (1591)

The first “to bake small meats” recipe is pretty straight forward, a honey sweetened pear puree tart with a thick cream sauce that uses all the things to thicken the sauce. The second tart is less clear. Instead of simmering the pear mixture its baked, with a ‘sirup’. Its not clear what the ‘sirup’ A.W. is talking about here.

“…and make your sirrop half with rosewater and half with that liquor & put double sugar to your Orenges, and when your sirup is halfe sodden…”

“To make sirup of Violets. … and put to them so much rosewater as you think good then let them boyle altogither untill the colour be forth of them, then take them of the fire and straine them through a fine cloth, then put so much Sugar to them as you thing good…”

So the ‘sirup’ in the second recipe can be three things:

the cream sauce from the first recipe.

sugar + the cooking liquid

sugar + rosewater and cooking liquid

It cannot be verjuice + sugar because I said so.

So a mad scientist er a medieval recipe enthusiast googles the recipes to see what other people have done, and as of today I found nothing for either recipe. The other option open to the cook is to try the variations and see which tastes better.

Make cream sauce: Take 2 egg yolks and mast in mortar and pestle, adding cream slowly. Stir the liquid in the mortar, and slowly pour through a colander into another bowl. Add spices, raisins, almond meal and bread crumbs into cream mixture. Stir well and set aside.

Pre-heat oven to 350.

Place pear puree, wine and honey into sauce pan and brig to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes.

Place 1 tbsp of pear mixture into each tart shell.

Bake for 35 minutes, until tarts are brown.

Place 1/2 tbsp of the cream mixture on each hot tart, spreading it out with a knife or spoon. Make sure there is at least 1 raisin on each tart.

I am deviating from English cooking for the following 16th Century, German recipe:

To make an apple tart. Take apples, peel them and grate them with a grater, afterwards fry them in fat. Then put in it as much grated cheese as apples, some ground cloves, a little ginger and cinnamon, two eggs. Stir it together well. Then prepare the dough as for a flat cake, put a small piece of fat into it so that it does not rise, and from above and below, weak heat. Let it bake slowly.Das Kuchbuch der Sabina Welserin

I found the recipe by throwing “apple” and “cheese” into the Medieval Cookery search engine because I had too many cooking apples and cheese wass on sale. Sometimes that’s just all the inspiration you need.

I confess, I hand grated the quartered apple slices and the peels came right off, I didn’t need to peel them. It’s very similar to how straining poached fruit through a colander also removes skins. I discovered it because I was rushing and didn’t pay attention. How will I ever learn if I get results like this?

My house smells like Christmas.

If I was taking my time with this I would look up recipes for ‘flat cake’ and do the crust properly.

Ingredients:

4-5 apples, peeled and grated

1 large tablespoon butter

1/4 tsp cloves, ground

1 tsp cinnamon, ground

1 tsp ginger, ground

7 oz cheese, grated

2 eggs, lighting beaten with a fork

a pie shell

Directions

Heat skillet on medium-high and melt butter. Add grated apple and saute until most of the moisture is absorbed.

Preheat oven to 350F.

Weight cooked apples and measure out an equal amount of cheese, or just add all the cheese and combine.

Add spices and egg to apple mixture and mix well.

Pour apple mixture into pie shell and bake for 50 minutes, until crust and top of pie have browned.

I was looking through past blog articles for a recipe and discovered that in the Beans and Thickeners article I mentioned that blood was also used as an egg replacer but I’d leave that recipe to Halloween.

Well I said I’d do it so here I go.

Blood pancakes (also known as Blodpannekake, Veriohukaiset, Blodpannkaka) are a traditionally served food from all over Northern Europe. The modern blood pancake recipes I found have molasses or a savoury component such as onions added to the mixture. I couldn’t find an early English recipe for griddle fried blood cakes even though they are certainly a traditional food.

The following recipe is an unsweetened baked blood cake recipe from Forme of Cury. I’d serve this simple cake with syrup, fruit compote, or with fried onions, as is done with the above traditional pancakes. The recipe is similar to bannock, but without any rising agents.

When cooking with blood to substitute for eggs use a ratio of 1/3 cup of blood for one egg, or 1/4 cup of blood for one egg white. I used pre-clotted blood from Asian grocery, if you have fresh blood add oatmeal 1 tbsp at a time until the dough is thick not runny.

Blood can be used as a colouring agent in recipes or as the sticky ‘egg wash’ for breading fish.

Directions
1) Preheat oven to 350F
2) Mix together blood, flour, lard, salt, and oatmeal. Kneed together with hands so that batter is an even burgundy or pink throughout.
3) Grease cake or pie pan. Pour batter into pan then press it flat.
4) Bake cake for 45 minutes, until bread is dry to touch, its hard to see ‘browning’ with such a dark cake.

Confession: I used gf flour so I could try it. Its really good. Is there nothing lard can’t make delicious?

I am researching chickpea recipes. I like chickpeas. I found this delightful recipe:

““Gloves,” that is ravioli.

Take white chickpeas, well softened in water; boil them well, then take them out of the water, minced finely and mix them with said water, and strain them; and with this strained water dilute the flour as you like and fry it on a low fire with lard and oil, and put some honey on top.

Another preparation. Dilute the flour with eggs, then make some gloves or other shape, as you like: set them to cook well in a pan with hot lard or oil.“An Anonymous Tuscan Cookery Book

LOOK AT IT!

So simple but it has inspired 4 days of chasing other recipes and facts so I am doing a whole blog post on just the process of redaction and will do the full recipe once I have bought dried chickpeas to play with.

The questions that this recipe inspired:

Q1: Is that a 14th Century vegan egg-replacement recipe?

Yes. The second half of the recipe “another preparation” covers that question. I believe that this is a recipe to make your own Aquafaba, which is a trendy ‘new’ ingredient.

(to do: find other medieval examples of legumes used as egg replacement)

Q2: Are there simple crepe/pancake/flat bread recipes that are simple flour plus egg or liquid?

Maybe? They had access to many different kinds of flours in the 14th Century.

Breadcakesandale has a list (although not a historic timeline) of different flours.

Wikipedia lists a lot of flours too. It discusses chickpeas being a neolithic crop so I am pretty comfortable declaring chickpea flour as a possible option for this recipe. [wikipedias course: Zohary, Daniel and Hopf, Maria, Domestication of Plants in the Old World(third edition), Oxford University Press, 2000, p 110]

Q4: If the recipe had chickpea flour (like you are wishfully thinking) would it work in this recipe?

Ok I didn’t find chickpea flour and aquafaba together in a crepe or pancake–chickpea flour has a strong flavour, which is my reasoning behind not combining them.

Q4: What will be your approach?

One cup of dried chickpeas will grow to about 2 1/2 cups. Soften chickpeas in water overnight. Strain chickpeas and discard the soaking water. Bring chickpeas to boil in enough water to cover, then reduce to simmer for ~1 hour. Start checking the chickpea progress at about 35-40 minute. The chickpeas have to be soft.